Sh*tty Jimmy says bye to sh*tty Ronnie at a 'You're The Worst' wake

Growing up feels like slow work in real life, and even slower on television as we watch our characters from the proverbial peanut gallery of their patently dysfunctional lives. It's been agony so far on Season 3 of You're The Worst, but after weeks of repression and regression, we're inching sneakily forward.

In episode 7, You're The Worst returns to its original format, with all the deceptive appearance of a sitcom and all the murky humor that makes it such an excellent show. The episode opens with a clever montage of Jimmy training like an athlete to finish his book and getting interrupted when a package arrives from England; Ronnie Overly's ashes, along with a note from Jimmy's sisters to plan his father's funeral.

Jimmy has no intention of fulfilling his father's or his sisters' wishes, so he returns to his noble artistic pursuits. Meanwhile, Gretchen meets with a prospective client, the perfectly cast Ben Folds as himself (fingers crossed that this turns into the new James Van Der Beek from Don't Trust the B—— in Apartment 23). As a character, Ben is not only a new client for Gretchen but a potential surrogate moral compass in the conspicuously post-Samira Wiley You're The Worst universe.

Gretchen meets with the simple everyman, Ben Folds.

Image: byron cohen/fx

Ben inspires Gretchen to do the right thing and insist that Jimmy host the memorial service. He agrees, if only because a wake is an airtight excuse for a party (it's not) and he can prepare a list of heckles to needle his father's omnipresent soul. There's also the highly convenient appearance of Freddy, an old friend of Ronnie's, who wants to read about him at the memorial.

The jig is up fairly quick; Freddy's note is from Ronnie, who wrote "I tried my best to love [Jimmy] but he rejected me." Jimmy grows visibly more purple throughout Ronnie's otherworldly missive, which contains lies about going to see Tony Shalhoub's Big Night and at least one hostile racial slur (classic Ronnie!).

Jimmy fully loses it in front of all the guests and rages against his father (Ronnie never even took him to see Big Night). He sees the note as nothing short of narcissistic, capped by the ultimate betrayal: Ronnie knew he was dying when they last saw each other. He was diagnosed within the past year, which means they could have made amends before the end.

After fleeing the wake, Jimmy opens up viscerally — you know it’s real because he’s alone, with no one but the ashes. Death, even when it perversely unites people, is ultimately between the dead and the living; Of the two people who knew that relationship, one is gone, and Jimmy bears the burden of being the only living soul who experienced it firsthand.

As with "Twenty-Two," the episode title carries weight. "The Only Thing That Helps" is weed for Edgar, sex for Lindsay — but remedies aren't universal. Medicating and diversions distract Jimmy, but the thing that helps is catharsis, which he finally allows himself, screaming into the night after kicking away his father's ashes.

A sanctimonious Lindsay agrees to help her sister reach an equal level of enlightenment.

Image: byron cohen/fx

In their own pivotal subplots, Edgar and Lindsay identify the things that will help them and pursue in earnest. The VA is extremely against Edgar using marijuana to deal with his PTSD; The man he speaks to tells Edgar that while pot is legal in California, Edgar served in the army for the United States — not just the Golden State (“How’d they pay you? Avocados and screenplays?”). It turns out everyone around Edgar is taking medical marijuana (including Ben Folds), so he takes the VA out of the equation and gets himself some weed.

Now that Lindsay came clean to Paul about wanting to "bone other people," he's trying his hardest to be cool with it — except "cool" isn't really Paul's thing, so it's a bit of a struggle (I know real-life Paul would insufferable, but Allan McLeod's performance continues to be unimpeachably delightful).

Paul watches his wife get physical with another man, with shocking results; A sexually reenergized Lindsay is positively simpering over her husband, and it strikes a hot nerve into the cold exterior of Becca. Will financial ruin and her imminent due date make Lindsay's sister the next to crack from emotional duress? Count on it.

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